Emeke Egbule Jersey

"Out here somewhere. No, not in the army exactly; no, nor in the navy, but--I expect him in camp to-night. If he comes you'll have to work when you ought to be asleep. No, he is not in the secret service, only in a secret service; running hospital supplies through the enemy's lines into ours."

"Maiden passing fair, turn away thine eyes! Turn away thine eyes ere my bosom burn,

"I shall count myself honored," said I, and we went, together and alone.

My whole nature was upheaved. You may smile, but my plight was awful. In the sultry night I grew cold. My bridle-hand, still lying under her palm, turned and folded its big stupid fingers over hers. Then our hands slid apart and we rode back. "I wish I were good enough to know the stars," she said, gazing up. "Tell me some of them."

"But if she--oh, yes!--Yes, to be sure; she could easily have got here yesterday afternoon."

I explained. While doing so I saw one of the guard reaching the prisoner's bridle to the other. Hah! Oliver had slapped the bridle free. In went his spurs! By a great buffet on the horse's neck he wheeled him, and with the rein dangling under the bits went over the fence like a deer. "Bang! bang! bang!"

I did so; but I felt sure I should ride beside him again as soon as he could make an opportunity; for it was plain that by a subtle unconfessed accord he and she had chosen me to be a true friend between them.

He moved straight landward through the cottonwoods, followed by the men in single file, but halted them while the rear was still discernible in the green tangle. Presently they unslung carbines, and I distinctly heard galloping. It was not far beyond the cottonwoods. The Yankees were after us. Suddenly it ceased. Over yonder, shoreward in the thicket, came a sharp command and then a second, and then, right on the front of the jungle, at the water's edge, the shots began to puff and crack, and the yellow river out here around the boat to spit!--spit!--in wicked white splashes. Every second their number grew. Behind me Quinn and his men stole away. But orders are orders and I had no choice but to watch the boat. The man in the stern had his back to me, and no face among the other five did I know. They were fast getting away, but the splashes came thick and close and presently one ball found its mark. The man at the stern hurriedly changed places with an oarsman; and as the relieved rower took his new seat he turned slowly upon his face as if in mortal pain, and I saw that the fresh hand at the oar was the brother of Major Harper. Just as I made the discovery "Boom!" said my small dust-cloud across the river, and "hurry-hurry-hurry-hurry-hurry-hurry-hurry--" like a train on a trestle-work--"boom!"--a shell left its gray track in the still air over the skiff and burst in the tops of the cottonwoods. The green thicket grew pale with the bomb's white smoke, yet "crack! crack!" and "spit! spit!" persisted the blue-coats' rifles. "Boom!" said again the field-piece on yonder side the water. Its shell came rattling through the air to burst on this side, out of the flashing and cracking of rifles and the sulphurous bomb smoke arose cries of men getting mangled, and I whimpered and gnawed my lips for joy, and I watched the boat, but no second shot came aboard, and--"Boom!--hurry-hurry-hurry- hurry"--ah! the frightful skill of it! A third shell tore the cottonwoods, its smoke slowly broadened out, a Federal bugle beyond the thicket sounded the Rally, and the cracking of carbines ceased.

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